Water safety equipment in the form of life vests and personal flotation devices (PFDs) are well known and in widespread use. However, existing U.S. Coast Guard approved inflatable PFDs and hybrid inflatable PFDs (those with some inherent buoyancy) are hindered by two significant problems. First, all known existing approved devices of this type use a yoke style inflatable chamber that surrounds the wearer's neck area which makes the device cumbersome and uncomfortable to wear, and virtually impossible for the wearer to swim in when inflated. Additionally, these known approved devices must be folded and/or re-packed after full inflation in order to be returned to their original wearable configuration.
United States Patent Application Publication No. 20040033739 discloses a multi-chambered personal survival device and an orally inflated, flush mounted, hybrid bladder configured, supported and protected by the external fabric shell of the underlying inherently buoyant PFD. The fabric shell of the foam PFD can be extended and cut to distribute and allocate the orally inflated buoyant moments to augment the buoyancy deficits of the specific underlying foam PFD design in order to create improved corrective turning, head angle, mandibular support and freeboard. The fabric shell while shaping the bladder, bears the strain of the oversized inflated bladder protecting the bladder film and seams from rupture. The internal orally inflated hybrid bladder is protected by the external fabric shell and or foam layer from UV radiation, abrasion and puncture allowing use of films or thin films as well as UL approved fabric supported laminates for construction of the hybrid bladder. An expiratory pump converts the released bladder into a self-bailing life raft.
The foregoing patent application and prior art discussion reflects the current state of the art of which the present inventor is aware. Reference to, and discussion of, this information is intended to aid in discharging Applicant's acknowledged duty of candor in disclosing information that may be relevant to the examination of claims to the present invention. However, it is respectfully submitted that none of the above-indicated references disclose, teach, suggest, show, or otherwise render obvious, either singly or when considered in combination, the invention described and claimed herein.